France’s Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode re-elects Ralph Toledano president for four-year term

By

Godfrey Deeny

Published
Jul 12, 2018

The General Assembly of the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode (FHCM) – French fashion’s governing body – in a meeting this Thursday has re-elected Ralph Toledano as President of the Federation for a new term of four years.

 
The four-year-tern is double his two previous mandates, and underlines the esteem in which the highly experienced Toledano is held.
 
The veteran executive is currently chairman of Victoria Beckham in London, where he was instrumental in the recent 30-million-pound investment in the brand by NEO Investment Partners and the partial acquisition of the Spice Girl’s burgeoning fashion house. 

“There’s a great ambience at the meeting. And I am very honored by the confidence my colleagues have expressed in me. Our goal now is to bring forward our project to make an even better school of creation and management at IFM,” Toledano told FashionNetwork.com, referring to the vast reorganization of France’s leading fashion college, due to reopen in its new form in September 2019 with greatly enlarged premises on the river Seine.
 
In a brilliant four-decade career, 66-year-old Toledano has also been the CEO of such high-profile luxury fashion marques as Karl Lagerfeld, Chloé and Guy Laroche. A noted talent spotter he is legendary for having appointed future superstars Phoebe Philo at Céline and Alber Elbaz at Guy Laroche. He first became Federation president in 2014 when he succeeded Didier Grumbach, another cerebral fashion authority. 
 
At the same meeting, the FHCM’s Assembly also re-elected the following senior fashion executives to its Executive Committee: Francesca Bellettini (Saint Laurent), Bruno Pavlovsky (Chanel), Guillaume de Seynes (Hermès), Sidney Toledano (LVMH Fashion Group, and no relation to Ralph). The Assembly also re-appointed Pascal Morand as the Federation’s executive president. Morand first became the Federation’s effective managing director in 2015, overseeing the six annual fashion seasons of Paris, the world’s unquestioned leading fashion capital.
 
“It’s a great news for Ralph, and excellent news for the Federation,” commented Morand.
 
In a related move, the assembly named the following executives to its Management Board: Pietro Beccari (Christian Dior), Francesca Bellettini, Geoffroy de la Bourdonnaye (Chloé), Etienne Bourgois (Agnès b.), Michael Burke (Louis Vuitton), Cédric Charbit (Balenciaga), Sophie Duruflé (Isabel Marant), Didier Grumbach (Honorary President of the FHCM), Joann Cheng  (Lanvin), Jean-Marc Loubier (Sonia Rykiel), Bruno Pavlovsky, Isabel Ribeiro (Paul Smith), Nicolas Santi-Weil (Ami), Guillaume de Seynes, Ralph Toledano, Sidney Toledano, Daniel Tribouillard (Leonard), Vincent Vantomme (Dries Van Noten). 
 
Beccari is the sole new arrival, as he succeeds the post formerly held by Sidney Toledano as Dior representative, while Sidney Toledano remains as head of LVMH's other major fashion houses. 
 
Three other candidates were put forward but not elected: Italian Delphine Bellini Schiaparelli, William Aline (Barbara Bui) and Gabriel de Linage (Azzaro).
 
“The Assembly renews its confidence in the current team the major objectives of which remain: strengthening Paris as the global Capital of Fashion, supporting emerging brands and implementing the major Design and Management School’s project intending to become the global leader,” the Federation said in a press release.
 
“New projects will be announced in the next weeks including a think tank aiming to decode and anticipate ongoing societal and technological changes,” the release added.